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The Tin Drum Volker Schlondorff The 1979 Academy Award winner for Best Foreign Film. The Tin Drum is a masterpiece of dazzling exuberance and originality adapted from the novel by Gunter Grass. The film is a stunning parable of modern society in violent transition narrated by a unique hero for our times - Oskar, a boy who decides at three not to grow any older. The DVD is a two disc Criterion Collection Edition set, and includes commentary by director and cowriter Volker Schlondorff; an isolated music track; deleted scenes; Volker Schlondorff Remembers The Tin Drum, a 21-minute montage featuring Schlondorff's thoughts and recollections about the film; a collection of video interviews with Schlondorff, actor David Bennent, cowriter Jean-Claude Carriere, actor Mario Adorf, and author Gunter Grass; a 1987 recording of Grass reading an excerpt from the novel, accompanied by percussionist Gunter "Baby" Sommer; an excerpt of the screenplay's original, unfilmed ending; Banned in Oklahoma, a documentary by Gary D. Rhodes following the lawsuit revolving around the film; production sketches, designs and promotional art; the original theatrical trailer; optional English subtitles; and more. German with English subtitles. West Germany, 1979, 142 min. DVD | $59.95
Billy Wilder Speaks Volker Schlondorff With a career that spanned more than five decades, Billy Wilder was responsible for some of the most popular and critically successful films of Hollywood's Golden Era, including Sunset Boulevard, Some Like it Hot, and Double Indemnity. This lively program uses clips, photographs, artwork, and copious interviews with the man himself to recount one of the most successful careers in Hollywood history. Filmed by Volker Schlondorff, the film features anecdotes, insights, wit, and wisdom. Includes bonus interview footage and on-camera commentary by Volker Schlondorff (70 mins.), gallery of Billy Wilder trailers, Wilder filmography, essay on the making of the film by Schlondorff, and English subtitle option. Germany/USA, 2006, 71 mins. DVD | $44.95
Circle of Deceit Volker Schlondorff Volker Schlondorff (The Tin Drum) creates a rich, humanist character study set amidst the turmoil of the Lebanese civil war, filmed on location in Beirut. A German reporter (Bruno Ganz), eager to forget his failed marriage, escapes to a war-torn Beirut to cover the war. The daily flirts with danger and death and an affair with a German ex-pat (Fassbinder regular Hanna Schygulla) breeds an undeniable cynicism and causes him to question his morals and intentions. "...a balanced, thoughtful, extremely moving vision of wartime tragedy" (Janet Maslin, The New York Times). The DVD is letterboxed, and includes a 29 minute, behind-the-scenes featurette from 1981, with commentary by Volker Schlondorff; a 15 minute, 2004 interview with Schlondorff; a stills gallery; optional English subtitles. In German with English subtitles. Germany, 1981, 108 mins. DVD | $44.95
Le Coup de Grace Volker Schlondorff Based on a novel by Marguerite Yourcenar and co-scripted by lead actress Margarethe von Trotta, Volker Schlondorff's film is an unforgettable tale of love, heartbreak and violence. Private passions define political alliances, as a woman rejected by the handsome, sexually repressed Prussian officer she loves, gives herself fully to the Communist cause. "A vivid and haunting experience" (Vincent Canby, The New York Times). With Matthias Habich, Rudiger Kirschstein and Matthieu Carriere. The DVD is a Criterion Collection edition and is letterboxed and includes interviews with Volker Schlondorff and Margarethe von Trotta. In German and French with English subtitles. West Germany/France, 1976, 98 mins. DVD | $44.95
Death of a Salesman (with Dustin Hoffman) Volker Schlondorff The widely acclaimed CBS television production of Arthur Miller's dark parable on the fallout of the American dream. Dustin Hoffman won an Emmy for his performance as Miller's anti-hero, Willy Loman, whose obsessive regard to be well-liked prompts the indifference and betrayal of his family. An extraordinary cast includes Kate Reid as Loman's long-suffering wife, and John Malkovich and Stephen Lang as Loman's failed sons, Biff and Happy. Also starring Charles Durning. The DVD includes Private Conversations (Christian Blackwood, 1986, 82 mins.), a feature-length documentary about the making of Death of a Salesman. In English. USA, 1985, 135 mins. DVD | $44.95
The Handmaid's Tale Volker Schlondorff Natasha Richardson, Robert Duvall, Faye Dunaway and Elizabeth McGovern star in Volker Schlondorff's stylish adaptation of Margaret Atwood's novel of the not-so-distant future. A fertile woman is forced by her country's government to serve as a Handmaid to the "Commander" and his wife, who has been made sterile by ecological disasters. In English. Great Britain/USA, 1990, 109 mins. DVD | $37.95
The Legend of Rita Volker Schlondorff Volker Schlondorff revisits the political terrain of some of his best films (The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum, Le Coup de Grace) with this fascinating story of a radical caught up in the historic changes of her homeland. Rita, the member of a terrorist organization in the '70s, comes to live in East Germany in the '80s, aided by the secret police who give her a new identity in exchange for information. "It's not propaganda for either side, but the story of how the division and reunification of Germany swept individual lives away indifferently in its tide" (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times). Bibiana Beglau and Nadja Uhl shared Best Actress honors at the Berlin International Film Festival. In German with English subtitles. Germany, 2000, 101 mins. DVD | $44.95
The Lost Honor of Katharina Blum Volker Schlondorff/Margarethe von Trotta This powerful adaptation of Heinrich Boll's Nobel Prize-winning novel is a fierce condemnation of police abuse and the reckless, irresponsible nature of sensational journalism. A shy housekeeper has a one-night-stand with a handsome stranger she meets at a party. The following morning she is arrested for terrorism and brutally interrogated. A smear campaign in the press forces the innocent woman to fight for her freedom and her reputation. Margarethe von Trotta made her directorial debut, in collaboration with Volker Schlondorff, with this frightening portrayal of injustice. Starring Angela Winkler, Mario Adorf, Heinz Bennent and Jurgen Prochnow. The DVD is a Criterion Collection edition, and is letterboxed, 16x9 widescreen, with interviews with the directors and cinematographer Jost Vacano, a documentary on Heinrich Boll, the original trailer, and more. German with English subtitles. West Germany, 1975, 109 mins. DVD | $44.95
The Ninth Day Volker Schlondorff New German Cinema veteran Volker Schlondorff (The Tin Drum) offers a fascinating fictionalized account of the gap in a Luxembourgian clergyman's diary, written during his internment at Dachau. John Bernard was mysteriously allowed nine days to attend his mother's funeral, and Schlondorff and screenwriters Eberhard Gorner and Andreas Pfluger attempt to piece together what might have happened. Their story puts Bernard (Ulrich Matthes, Downfall) at the center of a Nazi scheme to dissuade the Christian church from resisting their efforts, and the church's subsequent collaboration is one of Schlondorff's main focuses. Exacting in its attention to motivation and detail, this is a stinging rebuke to the cruel absurdities of the Nazi era. In German with English subtitles. Germany, 2004, 93 mins. DVD | $44.95
The Ogre Volker Schlondorff Germany's Nazi past is presented as a dark fable in Volker Schlondorff's (The Tin Drum) adaptation of Michel Tournier's novel Le Roides Aulnes. John Malkovich stars as a French prisoner of war, ordered by his German captors to round up children for Hitler's youth movement, only to see them sacrificed on the front lines as the Third Reich begins to collapse. Armin Mueller-Stahl and Marianne Sagebrecht co-star. Original music by Michael Nyman. "A remarkable accomplishment by a major director working with the cream of Germany's character actors" (Kevin Thomas, L.A. Times). In English. Germany/France/Great Britain, 1996, 117 mins. DVD | $37.95
Palmetto Volker Schlondorff In this hot and sexy film noir from Volker Schlondorff (The Tin Drum), Woody Harrelson is Harry, a small-timer facing hard time if he can't untangle a mystery involving three women (Elisabeth Shue, Gina Gershon, Chloe Sevigny), false identities, cold corpses and a string of clues that point to him as the murderer. In English. USA/Germany, 1998, 113 mins. DVD | $44.95
Strike Volker Schlondorff Volker Schlondorff's gritty and overtly sentimental labor story is based on the life of Anna Walentynowicz (played here by Katharina Thalbach), an illiterate working woman who had a forceful hand in the creation of Poland's Solidarity movement. Her firing from the Gdansk shipyard in 1980 inspired a wave of strikes across the then communist country. Strike's heroine is a single mother and a model employee, but her stubborn adherence to notions of right and wrong brings her head-to-head with communist bureaucrats at the shipyard and eventually her government. "I wanted to show by using all this agitprop mass material about the heroic worker that the image that had been built of the proletarian superman was just an image. It was just a prop. The reality behind it was incredibly bleak. At least now, there's no lie" (Volker Schlondorff, Reverse Shot). In Polish with English subtitles. Germany/Poland, 2006, 104 mins. DVD | $37.95
Swann in Love Volker Schlondorff Jeremy Irons, Ornella Muti, Alain Delon star in Schlondorff's engrossing, sexy film based on Proust's monumental modern novel, centering on a wealthy gentleman who thrives in the finest circles of high society and risks everything for his erotic obsession. DVD includes optional English subtitles, an alternate English language track, and a filmography. In French with English subtitles. West Germany/France, 1984, 110 mins. DVD | $37.95
Young Toerless Volker Schlondorff With this, his first feature film, Volker Schlondorff created a milestone of the new German cinema and crystalized the emotions of a country still struggling to come to terms with its recent past of Nazi horror. Based on Robert Musil's novel, the film is a chilling parable of how people could come to accept the worst in human behavior. Set in a military boarding school, the story follows a shy, intelligent boy who witnesses, but does not report, the humiliation and torture of a fellow classmate. When he finally comes to realize his moral obligation to help the abused student, he finds it may be too late. Starring Mathieu Carriere, Marian Seidowsky, Bernd Tischer and Barbara Steele. The DVD is a Criterion Collection Edition, and includes video interview with writer-director Volker Schlondorff, presentation of the original score by composer Hans Werner Henze with a video introduction by Volker Schlondorff, trailer, new English subtitle translation, and more. In German with English subtitles. West Germany/France, 1966, 90 mins. DVD | $44.95
